An insight into the world of films from a girl obsessed with jellyfish

Day 103 – Alien 3

One film enjoyed. One film hated. I wonder what the next installation of the Aliens marathon will be?

Aliens 3. We again follow Ripley, the only survivor from both films, as she crash lands on a planet converted to a prison where yet another alien is waiting to cause destruction.

You may remember how I said that the previous Alien movie was considered the best of the lot. Well, this one is supposedly considered the worst.

What do I think? I prefer this one.

Before you get all ‘Kill the bitch’ on me, just hear me out.

The first thing you need to consider is the amount of aliens in this film compared to the previous one. There were swarms and swarms of the bastards in the last one. Plus their queen. It was very difficult for one to sneak up on you when it’s being followed by about a cazillion more. In this one, the director went back to the original and only had one alien. And I was on edge so much more. It wasn’t quite as tense as the first one, because you could kind of guess when the alien was going to pop up. We just know these things now. But I don’t care. There were still moments that caught me off guard and shocked me. And that is what I think this whole franchise should be about. The fear of the unknown. Not knowing when the bugger will pop up and nom on your face. Not shooting and big ass guns. That’s just stupid.

The next thing I think is better is the situation that Ripley is put in. In Aliens, she is conveniently around army people that know how to fight and have all the awesome equipment to kill the aliens ( that seemed to be indestructible and were actually called ‘the perfect life form’ by Ash after asking how it could be killed in the first movie). In this film, she is surrounded by murderers, rapists, arsonist…pretty messed up people that had probably started to go insane (or in Golic’s case had most definitely gone insane) that were imprisoned in a high security building that are too scared to have weapons inside in case the prisoners go a little crazy. Which situation would you rather be in? Hmm? How can you say that this film doesn’t make you feel on edge, when you think that she could be raped or strangled or stabbed at any moment by these psychopaths? *sigh*

The acting is significantly better in this film too. This could be me being biased, because I noticed that pretty much all the prisoners were so British it actually hurt. And they swore so much! It must be a British thing. But it was funny at the same time as it was scary. The characters from the previous film just made me want them all to die. I didn’t want a single one to die in this film. They were interesting without being obnoxious.

And then there’s the ending. This film had the most perfect ending to a film ever made. It was incredible! It was one of those resounding moments where you think ‘Yes. This is where it all ends, and it was perfect.’ How can you trash such an amazing ending? Oh, I know. Probably because there was one alien and no guns? Really people. You astound me.

I completely and utterly disagree with Rotten Tomatoes and everyone that says that this is the worst film out of the Aliens franchise. I thoroughly enjoyed this film. It was exciting, it was funny, it was sad. All the emotions that should have been in the second movie came into this one, and I enjoyed it. I won’t go saying it’s better than the original, because it isn’t. But it’s a damn sight better than Aliens.